Our Team
Faculty
Michael Gollner
Associate Professor and Deb Faculty Fellow
- (510)642-3371
- mgollner@berkeley.edu
- 6105A Etcheverry Hall
Carlos Fernandez-Pello
Distinguished Professor of the Graduate School
- ferpello@me.berkeley.edu
Wuquan Cui
Postdoctoral Scholar
- wuquancui@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: Emissions of wildland fires, smoldering and flaming combustion, fire whirls
Mitchell Huffman
Postdoctoral Scholar
- mhuffman@berkeley.edu
- Research Interests: Experimental Fire Spread, Wildfire/WUI Emissions
Yiren Qin
Postdoctoral Scholar
Research Areas: Fire spread modeling
- +91-89898989898
- yirenqin712@berkeley.edu
Daniel San Martin
Postdoctoral Scholar
- dsanmartin@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: Wildfire Modeling
Dwi Marhaendro Jati Purnomo
Postdoctoral Scholar
- dwimjpurnomo@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: wildland fire behavior, WUI fire
Kelly Clevenson
Ph.D. Candidate
- kclevenson@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: fire behavior, fire spread
Bryce Bathras
PhD Candidate
NSF GRFP and Chancellors Fellow
- bryce_bathras@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: Emissions from Fires, Flame Spread
Jose Rivera
PhD Student
- jose_rivera@berkeley.edu
Melanie Earle
PhD Student
- melanie_earle@berkeley.edu
- Research Areas: WUI Fire Spread Modeling
Ethan Levin
Ph.D. Student
- primeofone5over@berkeley.edu
- Research areas: Surface to crown fire transition, buoyant vortices
Adam Laird
Ph.D. Student
- adam.laird@berkeley.edu
- Research areas: Computational Fire Modeling
Postdoctoral Scholars at the University of California, Berkeley
Maryam Zamanialaei, Ph.D., 2022-2025 (First Position, Senior Data Scientist, Kettle)
Ahmad Syihan Auzani, Ph.D., 2024-2025, Visiting Researcher from Universitas Indonesia
Shaorun Lin, Ph.D., 2022-2024 (First Position, Research Assistant Professor at Hong Kong Polytechnic University)
Xiaoyu Ju, Ph.D., 2023 (First Position, Research Professor, USTC)
Luca Carmignani, Ph.D., 2021 (First Position, UC Cooperative Extension, Assistant Fire Advisor)
Sriram Bharath Hariharan, Ph.D., 2021 (First Position, Lucid Motors)
Franz Richter, Ph.D., 2020-2021 (First Position, McKinsey & Company)
Jeanette Cobian-Iñiguez, Ph.D., 2020-2021 (First Position, Assistant Professor, UC Merced)
Mohammadhadi Hajilou, Ph.D., 2021-2022 (First Position, Assistant Professor, University of Portland)
Charles Scudiere, Ph.D., 2021-2022 (First Position, Lucid Motors)
Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley
Siyan Wang, Ph.D., 2025
Joseph Dowling, Ph.D., 2025
Maria Theodori, Ph.D., P.E., 2025 (First Position, Principal Fire Scientist, CloudFire Inc.)
Christina Liveretou, Ph.D., 2025 “Effect of Pressure and External Heating on Microgravity and Earth Gravity Fires”
Priya Garg, Ph.D., 2023 “An experimental study of smoldering-to-flaming transition and emissions from wildland vegetative fuels” (First Position, Senior Test Engineer, Rivian)
Masters of Science at the University of California, Berkeley
Mackenzie Conckling, M.S.
Michael Wright, M.S.
Andy Rodriguez, M.S., 2020
Undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley
Madeleine Bardy, Gurnoor Bhatti, Abhik Dutta, Lilly Etzenbach, Carol Gonzalez Perez, Jason Guardado, Ronaldo Lopez-Tucux, Yichi Ma, Andrew Petrak, Sebastián Quiroz, Carina Romero, Kimia Sattary, Katrina Sharonin, Stephen Salazar, Kenny Song, Jingtao Tan, Jacqueline Thibault
Postdoctoral Scholars at the University of Maryland
Mohammadhadi Hajilou, Ph.D., 2019-2020 (First Position, Senior Engineer at GexCon)
Hamed Farahani, Ph.D., 2017-2018 (First Position, Postdoctoral Scholar at WPI, Current Position, FM Global)
Ali Tohidi, Ph.D., 2016-2017 (First Position, One Concern, Current position, Assistant Professor San Jose State University)
Ph.D. at the University of Maryland
Xingyu Ren, Ph.D., 2022 (First Position, Thermal analysis engineer, Rivian)
Sriram Bharath Hariharan, Ph.D., 2021, “Experimental Investigations and Scaling Analyses of Whirling Flames” (First Position, Lucid Motors)
Raquel Hakes Weston-Dawkes, Ph.D., 2021 “Studies of Wildland Fires: Inclined Flame Instabilities and Fire Exposure to Structures” (First Position, postdoctoral scholar, Sandia National Laboratories)
Pietro Maisto, Ph.D., 2019 “Turbulent Transport and Mixing of Unconfined and Sloped Fire-Induced Flows Using a Laser-Assisted Saltwater Modeling Technique” (First Position, Postdoctoral Scholar, Aerospace Engineering, University of Maryland).
Wei Tang, Ph.D., 2017 “Forward Heating in Wind-Driven Flames,” (First Position: National Institute for Standards and Technology, Wildland-Urban Interface Group, Current position, FPE at NIOSH)
Colin H. Miller, Ph.D., 2017 “Fluid Dynamics of Boundary Layer Combustion“.
Ajay V. Singh, Ph.D., 2015 “A Fundamental Study of Boundary Layer Diffusion Flames” (First Position, Postdoctoral Scholar at Stanford University. Current Position, Assistant Professor, IIT Kanpur)
Masters of Science at the University of Maryland
Lanford Price, M.S., 2021
Evan Sluder, M.S., 2019, “Understanding the Influence of Wind and Slope on Flames in Wildland Fires“
Hamed Salehizadeh, M.S., 2019, “Critical Ignition Conditions of Structural Materials by Cylindrical Firebrands“
Lana Benny, M.S., 2019, “A Study of Intermittent Convective Heating Effects on Fine Fuel Ignition”
Sriram Bharath Hariharan, M.S., 2017, “The Structure of the Blue Whirl: A Soot-Free Reacting Vortex Phenomenon.”
Wuquan Cui, M.S. as part of the IMFSE Program, 2017 “Influence of Double-Skinned Facades on Fire Safety.”
Raquel Hakes, M.S., 2017 “Thermal Characterization of Firebrand Piles”
Nathaniel May, M.S., 2017 “Moisture Content Effects on Energy and Emissions Released During Combustion of Pyrophytic Vegetation“.
Sara Caton, M.S., 2016 “Laboratory Studies on the Generation of Firebrands from Cylindrical Wooden Dowels“
Brian Cohen, M.S., 2014 “In Situ Burning Alternatives“
Colin Miller, M.S., 2014 “Upward Flame Spread Over Discreet Fuels”
Daniel Gorham, M.S., 2014 “Studying Wildland Fire Spread Using Stationary Burners”
Zhao Zhao, M.S., 2014 “Flame Spread Through Wooden Dowels”
Brian Hall, M.S., 2014 “Transient Fire Load on Aluminum Ferries”
Undergraduates at the University of Maryland
Bryce Bathras, Sara Caton, Stephen Ernst, Alicea Fitzpatrick, Daniel Gorham, Erin Griffith, Raquel Hakes, Matthew Kaminow, Kyle Kohler, Seth Lattner, Irene Lemboros, Conor McCoy, Stephanie Poole, Joseph Praydis, Peter Raia, Thomas Roche, Stephen Salazar, Maxwell Scott, Nicole Welch, Matthew Weston-Dawkes
Visiting Graduate Students at UMD
Zhenxiang Tao, Tsinghua University, China, 2018-2019
Xiaoyu Ju, PhD, University of Science and Technology, China, 2018
Lin Jiang, USTC, 2015-2016
Yu Hu, Tsinghua University, China, 2017-18
Kun Zhao, USTC, China, 2016-17
Visiting Undergraduate Students at UMD
Janis Tieck, Mannheim University, Germany, 2018
Jessen Chrisyla Oey, Mannheim University, Germany, 2018
Jan Zimlich, University of Mannheim, Germany, 2015
Jens Triller, University of Mannheim, Germany, 2014-15
Visiting Faculty at UMD
Tao Xu, Shanghai Maritime University, 2019-20
Liu Quiong, Central South University, China, 2016-17
Xinje Huang, Anhuhi University, China, 2016-17
Mark Finney, USFS Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory
Sara McAllister, USFS Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory
Daniel Jimenez, USFS Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory
Antonio L. Sánchez, University of California, San Diego
Xinyan Huang, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Yuji Nakamura, Toyohashi University of Technology, Japan
Ali Rangwala, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA
Forman A. Williams, University of California, San Diego, USA
Elaine S. Oran, University of Maryland, USA
Jessica Oakes, Northeastern University